AUD/USD extends daily slide toward 0.6900

• AUD/USD is staying under modest bearish pressure on Wednesday.
• Greenback is staying relatively strong against its major rivals.
• FOMC members Evans and Bullard will be speaking later in the day.

The AUD/USD pair capitalized on the upbeat PMI data from Australia and the risk-on environment and closed the first two days of the week in the positive territory. However, the pair lost its traction on Wednesday and tested 0.6900 during the European trading hours. As of writing, AUD/USD was down 0.2% on the day at 0.6915.

Earlier in the day, the sharp drop witnessed in the NZD/USD pair following the Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s dovish policy outlook seems to have weighed on the positively-correlated AUD/USD as well. At the moment, NZD/USD is down 0.83% on a daily basis.

Moreover, the heavy selling pressure surrounding major European equity indexes and the poor performance of the US stock index futures reflect a dismal market mood, which puts additional weight on the risk-sensitive AUD.

USD goes into consolidation ahead of GDP data

On the other hand, the US Dollar Index (DXY) is posting modest daily gains near 96.70, allowing the bearish pressure on the pair to remain intact. In the second half of the day, investors will be paying close attention to Chicago Fed President Charles Evans’ and St. Louis Fed President James Bullard’s speeches in the absence of significant macroeconomic data releases.

On Thursday, the Australian economic docket won’t be featuring any data releases either and markets’ focus will be on the GDP report from the US. Investors expect the US economy to contract by 5% on a quarterly basis in the first quarter.

Technical levels to watch for